Succession Planning Guidebook & Report

of electricity human resources canada um electricity human resources canada or

ehrc for those of you who don’t know us uh we are a national non-for-profit organization

that researches human resources challenges and opportunities in the electricity sector and we developed the tools to uh to

address them we bring together industry stakeholders to provide both a a national and a provincial

perspective on issues that are affecting the sector and we’re the only national electricity organization that supports

hr and skills development and ensures industry stakeholders across canada have a voice

now today’s succession planning guidebook is the latest in a range of tools to support the demographic changes that we see

occurring in the sector that includes the course the move towards renewables and

lowering uh greenhouse gas emissions and of course the impact of digital and technical

technological innovation so disruption is all around us make no mistake we are in a war for

talent um we can no longer depend on poaching from each other in the sector indeed indeed we actually face

competition from other industries with long lead times to full competencies in many of our occupations

and many roles being portable in and out of this sector we need to plan accordingly and this

guidebook has been developed to help you plan for both your current and future workforce needs i would like

to thank our partners the government of alberta who supported this project um as well as our steering committee

here in alberta who have so graciously given their time to guide the work thank you so much to fortis alberta nmax

corporation the alberta electric electric system operator raiso transalta acco and capital power

corporation now i’m going to now hand you over today’s moderator anita gara anita is ehrc’s western uh

representative and the project lead for the succession planning initiative anita will speak to our succession

planning guide provide some context and introduce our our guests today i know i’m very much looking forward to

the discussion and to their insights and i do encourage you to ask questions at during our q and a so anita over to you

thank you for that introduction michelle and good afternoon everyone it’s a pleasure to be here today as we launch

the succession planning guide book uh as michelle mentioned i am calgary based so i would like to take this

opportunity before we begin to quickly acknowledge the traditional territories of the people of the treaty

7 region in southern alberta which includes the blackfoot as well as the surtina first nation and the stoney

dakota the city of calgary is also home to the metis nation of alberta region 3.

it’s uh it’s always exciting when we launch a new resource here electricity human resources canada the timing of

launching a new succession planning guide book for alberta’s electricity sector and beyond couldn’t be more

appropriate the ships in the workplace related to the pandemic and the sheer pace of

change the electricity industry is facing talent has never been more important to

the success of an organization and organizations now more than ever need to be prepared

so what is this guidebook the succession planning guidebook is a straightforward and practical

reference that includes best practice process descriptions to manage succession planning in your organization so whether you’re

just getting started with or looking to make improvements to your existing family

to develop this guidebook we had the privilege of working with the government of alberta in partnership with the canadian government

we’ve also drawn on our latest labor market information intelligence study data as well as our

unique national view of what’s happening in the electricity industry and that includes assessments

of several organizations current succession planning programs the work was led and

supported by a steering committee of experienced hr practitioners from across the sector

the result is a framework for effective succession planning and management including how to define critical roles

and positions and competencies identify and develop successor employees manage talent pipelines

and communicate your succession strategy throughout your organization the guidebook it also covers key points

of theory and process and provides practical tools and worksheets for collecting and analyzing

information you need to develop a succession plan i would like to point out that the succession planning guidebook does make

a distinction between succession management and succession planning guidebook states

that succession management is the systematic and planned process an organization uses to identify

and develop the critical skills and competencies it requires whereas succession planning is the focus

process for keeping uh talent in the pipeline by identifying and developing people to be appointed to

selected uh critical positions when required so i would just like for us to keep that in mind

for the duration of this session so the guidebook is now available on our website at

electricityhr.ca it is available in an english in english and in french and digital first versions

i encourage you to go check it out knowing that we are here every step of the way

for for you to support you in that in your succession planning journey so before we begin the the panel session

i i would like to remind our audience to mute your microphones for the duration of the session

questions can be asked via the chat box and if we do run out of time uh we can touch base with you after this

session individually via email uh and this session is also being recorded

so excuse me so as i previously mentioned um the development of the succession

planning guidebook uh was led and supported by a steering committee of experienced hr practitioners from

across the sector it gives me great pleasure to introduce to you today three of those members

who will focus the conversation around succession planning and electricity organizations

they include sheila l our steering committee chair and director talent acquisition talent management and pension and

benefits at atco sheila is a strategic resource oriented senior leader in talent practice area of

hr including recruiting onboarding leadership development succession management coaching

engagement and well-being she lands over 15 years experience leading high performance teams

and has worked with canadian tire intact insurance atp and adco she graduated from

the university of calgary with a master’s in leadership our next panelist is tisha iglesias

manager talent and partners in inclusion at the alberta electric system operator

tisha has 20 years professional practice in human resources in healthcare information technology and the utilities

sector she currently leads a dynamic business partner team at the iso with oversight

of talent management programs as well as inclusion and diversity an mru alumni and graduate from the

university of lethbridge tisha is a wife and a mother she strives living a purpose-driven life

learn new things and paid for to help others thrive our final panelist is nicole pedy

director talent strategies and hr business partnering at nmax corporation

nicole is a senior human resource leader with over 20 years of progressive strategic hr and marketing experience nicole

joined nmax corporation in 2019 where she works with stakeholders throughout the organization

to deliver innovative program design provide strategic partnership and align the hr strategy with the

overall corporate direction nicole’s hr experience includes leading teams in health

promotion talent management and hr advisory services in academic energy resources

and public service sectors and with a commitment to lifelong learning nicole has completed

multiple graduate certificate programs for royal roads university and graduated from the organizational

coaching program at the university of british columbia in april 2018.

so welcome panelists it’s a pleasure having you here with us as we launch the succession planning guidebook

um i just want to get right into it and and ask you this so many people think succession planning

should be limited to those at the top of the organization chart how important do you feel

it is to look at mission critical positions across the organization so maybe nicole we can start with you

yeah and uh thank you anita thank you for having me here today um you know too often we tend to plan

for for leadership roles and i don’t think we can lose sight of those roles that are critical to our operation

when i think about succession planning you know i kind of fashion it similar you know we

buy insurance uh to protect against floods we have security systems for security purposes

and we back up our data to protect our company and your succession plan is your business continuity insurance um

that requires grooming of your employees and we saw a lot of this during the

pandemic right when we needed to identify our critical roles um i think many of us in canada were

quite lucky um compared to some of our friends down south

who were more impacted i was talking to someone last week where quite a bit of their workforce was

out in their safety sensitive critical roles and they were able to leverage their succession plan for those that

were off ill or that were out for quarantining purposes so i i think it’s extremely critical

that we do look beyond leadership roles and those roles that keep the core operations

going and that are either safety sensitive and are required for business continuity purposes i don’t

know sheila do you have any thing to add to that yeah absolutely so to add to that i would also um

look at what it is the skills that’s going to be required over the next 10 years because that is changing and so

it may necessarily be a formal leadership role because we are getting into a space

where you’re managing projects in a matrix environment and that requires a different

level of expertise so have we actually identified what that would look like and

how critical that would be to the success for the organization moving forward so you may have this informal ability to

lead p l in a huge project with certain skills and and are we good at identifying that

because we put that talent walk on the door because there isn’t anything that’s really engaging to them

and now they’re going to start to see that moving forward because it’s not going to necessarily be like what we’ve seen in the past where

everything’s full-time work or everything a leadership role as a director or vp it could be

these special projects that two to three year terms but they’re critical to the organization how do we

keep them on different projects so i would just add in that from what you were saying nicole

interesting very interesting okay so i do have a two-part question that kind of that definitely ties in with this

and so who owns responsibility for the succession planning process so

is it just the hr manager or who else needs to be involved and how and um how do you

advise hr leaders in making succession a priority for their organization and getting that necessary buying from

management um tisha how about you sir thank you uh you know i i believe

that succession planning is it’s a business process and and you know hr is there to help the

organization enable that process to to partner with them through those conversations

to help them look micro and macro you know trying to look at you know

as as nicole and sheila mentioned you know start thinking about these critical roles and the impact they have

in the organization um start thinking about um you know the future

of of talent and and what’s happening in the space around talent in the workplace and and people

being able to have that talent fluidity and organization to move around um where you have those needs and and

but then those also open up other development opportunities for others in your organization as well

too and i think that’s also critically important and and as nicole said you know the impact of the pandemic

lately has has really brought to the forefront how organizations really need to

think critically around this this process from a business perspective and look at at it as a business contingency

and and risk management as well too so that you know in an unprecedented times of

something like a pandemic you know you can still still survive and hopefully thrive

you know through that in terms of of the business operations and the strategic priorities of the organization

okay nicole would you like to add anything to that yeah um i think tasha really captured

that quite nicely and where i have been able to

coach leaders on this is how do you make it real for them and help them understand like and

especially those that might have hard to recruit roles like you know what would be the impact to you

if you this role’s vacant for six months and not only that but we all know you know

the orientation the uptake getting people up to speed and up to productivity so really trying to make it real for

leaders and um really trying to tie it in to the talent chain

for them as well so they can actually see the impact to it and then i think the other thing as well

that i like to offer organizations and this is you know if you have a reputation

of being an organization that invests in their talent makes it part of their system it’s another lever

for attraction especially those that want to come in and grow their career so there are other benefits um outside

of the risk mitigation piece as well okay sounds good um i was gonna save the questions for the

end but i do see one question that ties in directly to the conversation we’re having now and the question is do you see more

people becoming contractors versus full-time permanent employees how do you how do you feel about that statement

i i just wrote it i think it’ll be a balance i don’t think you’ll see one overtake the other it’s just we do

have like different uh at least in my area where i work with

atco enterprise is that we have full-time employees we have part-time employees and then we

have gig workers which means that here two to five years and could continue being here

that move into permanent as well so it’s just the flexibility that we need to look at to accommodate

what’s important also for that individual so what matters to the employee as well as what matters to adco

it’s it’s a two-way relationship but i think sometimes the reason why i

was going there that we tend to forget about that when we do succession planning like we don’t necessarily identify them

as critical to the organization right do you want to comment

on on that point yeah i know i i just an extension of that i i think too

the other piece around succession planning is that it does feed into other other key critical

processes and i think nicole kind of touched on that when she talked about you know how to how to just position the

why and make it real and meaningful to a business leader in the downstream impacts of just not

planning now so you know succession planning also has impacts into your workforce planning and

and even to what sheila is saying too you know how do we leverage contingent workers and how do we leverage

other valuable you know components of the workforce that all provide value to

help enable other things and then and then succession planning also feeds into

into your town acquisition because then you know you’re starting to think about then you know future

future growth or or just new skills in the organization that maybe you have to buy those um

you’re not ready yet to build that internally or or just adding on to as sheila had mentioned earlier just

what’s happening five ten years down for the organization from a strategy perspective and

and where where do we need to shift and pivot um from a talent strategy so it’s very interconnected and and um

and uh definitely not just like a silo lens of replacement charts which you know

that’s what succession planning has been in the past right okay so um i’ve heard it said

that an organization’s people and talent capital needs need to be approached as wisely as their

financial capital needs would you agree with that statement and why sheila perhaps you could take this

one sure um kind of talking through what we were originally when

nicole was going on to risks and mitigating risks when we look at financial capital

a lot of times there’s a conversation on a regular basis monthly let’s just use monthly as the example

where you would go in and have this conversation of where you are with your kpis but what tends to

happen is the people part gets ignored and it should have the same rigor where we’re talking about how our people

on a regular basis and why that’s becoming more and more important because of the war for talent

but what we’re seeing is there are the people related risks that the pandemic has put the employees

physical mental social and financial health in the spotlight so when we look at succession or when we

look at how that impacts it we have to highlight those exposures

and and how do we do succession planning when it comes to this and how can it be managed so that’s the

dialogue where we really need to start thinking through and do we have the appropriate tools as hr practitioners to help our

managers know how to engage those conversations on a monthly basis just like we would

with a financial capital kpi um

i’ll give one more piece of an example like are are we going to just talk about we have someone

ready now like we would traditionally or are we going to have more dynamic conversation around our people

and ancestors can be cross-functional not just a replacement to one role yeah

so what are those conversations that we’re having what are those kpis that we’re really looking at

what kind of story are we trying to tell it seems very logical sorry tisha go

ahead i was just gonna say you know and sheila i really i really resonate with that and even

bringing data to that conversation as well too because you know if you take the finance lines

you know they say that the devil’s in the details right and and and sometimes you do need to bring that

data towards that conversation to help enable um that ready for now i i

think that’s such a key one where it’s um sometimes it’s very um

you know well what does that mean um and and ready for what and where

where does the organization truly need these skills and capabilities that this person holds that we’re saying is right

now and looking broader than just maybe that divisional or departmental

um you know line that they’re in um do they have other capabilities in the

organization that’s the need that we want to actually move and fulfill and so

i think that’s where um you know bringing in this holistic conversation around the talent

and making it it to your point very meaningful not just for

the exercise but for the organization as a whole and where the organization is

needing to go and trying to go um from a strategy and also from a talent strategy perspective

nicole did you have something to say okay all right sounds good um so i have a

two-part question and it’s about what is the biggest misconception about effective succession

planning and um why would you recommend the ehrc succession planning guidebook um

tisha perhaps you could comment sure you know um just just from my own

perspective i think um a big misconception

is is that there’s a perfect way or a perfect model or and i don’t think

there is a perfection i think that you know every organization has um a starting point wherever that

wherever they are and and you evolve and you go through probably some growing pains and you’ll

go through growing pains at different cycles as you continue to go through that process but i think a big misconception

is thinking that it’s owned by um you know hr and and that you know

it’s their thing to do um and to drive and and and i really think that it’s it’s

not it’s it’s it’s hr really helping to enable the business to really go through this

business planning to be there as a as a partner and the supporter um and um and and i also think that

sometimes you know there’s always lessons learned and what may be perceived as not getting it

right and that’s okay um sometimes those are purposeful and sometimes at the um being on the hr

side of things you aren’t always able to influence in the moment in time but

it doesn’t necessarily fall on deaf ears and and eventually you’ll be able to

to see um shifts as long as you really try to as nicole said

meet people where they are and and try to make it very real and meaningful for them and and understand what that pressure point

is for for for the business or for the leader and try to meet them there and help them to to see where it is so

it’s not easy and i and it’s and i don’t think it’s a one model fits all or

one model is a perfect i think that it’s something that many organizations adapt and grow

through um but again it’s a partnership a partnership effort with the business

driving in nhr supporting it and why would i recommend the guidebook

i think the guidebook has great content in there that it is practical and i think that

the practical applications of of the guidebook are so helpful for any organization regardless of where

you are in your own internal practice and process around succession planning and so it’s

quite refreshing because it really um allows you to really just

think think through that if you’re on the hr side of things and to really

you know challenge your own thinking as to what you’re doing and also bring some other components to the conversation

um and and perhaps even the delivery and from a leader perspective it’s great to be able to

start to get yourself into that mindset and thinking around

you know this this planning process and its meaning and its intent and um and try to think broader around

that not just going through the motion but the communication strategy around that as well too so

those are the things that i i find extremely valuable from from the guidebook

sheila how about yourself so where i think it’s very helpful is is

that it’s agile in that you used to use certain piece of it because that’s where it works for you

for your maturity level is as an organization so it may not make sense for you to use

all pieces but if you really want to focus on here because that’s your biggest

pain point or priority then do it and that’s how i feel it was really quite helpful

versus i have to do all steps in order for session planning to be successful because it’s not it’s

we all know life gets busy we get busy we don’t always have the time

to follow through on absolutely everything but if we have something we can pick up

and use and it’s easy to use then we can use it and so that’s how

i feel this is a benefit is that you can do that with this

nicole would you like to add something yeah i know i just echo what everyone says it’s a scalable tool

so if it’s just if you haven’t if you don’t have any processes to be able to identify what a critical

positions are um i think we’ve all been in organizations where um

people feel everyone is critical everyone’s important not everyone’s critical and you know i

love how the process it’s very clear and it gives some great guidelines and you know if you are at an advanced

process it gives you some ideas around development planning again what tisha is talking about how to start activating it taking it from a plan

pulling it through the system and making it real so yeah those are a few things um

there’s a question from the audience that ties in again to to to the conversation right now and it says um

should progression paths be publicly available to staff kids see where they transfer their

skills versus going through hr how do you feel about that statement

i open the floor

um so i’m trying to interpret so i hope

understand the question but i’ll take a little bit of it how’s that and then um we can go from

there but when i see that i think it’s about making it transparent

that you’ve put the effort as the individual into your development and then if i think about it a bit

further um because that’s where we’re working through right now is inclusive leadership

so when we do succession planning that we aren’t taking in our own bias so transparent can help with that

so there’s one side of where i see that’s important is to be able to show your progression

of where you’re developing and having that transparent as to where you want to go on your career

directory but i’m not sure progression paths be publicly available

if i hit that right as to what the question fully said so hopefully that answers part of it

anyone else have an interpretation on yeah i i i really would you with what

she said she lives well too and if if i’m interpreting the question

correctly i know that where our organization is working on at least

from our engineering community on publishing an engineering progression path so that

was a lot of work that we did this year with the engineering

group we we had a mix of some individual contributors and some leaders that we formed a sprint team to gather

on and then did some deeper work with some senior leaders in our engineering group to really

outline different streams of technical or managerial track

because prior this this group in our organization really felt

but like development was really if you went into leadership and didn’t really see a clear technical

stream and so for us from a progression level perspective you know yes we’ve done that

work on that lens and we’re just going through the um the rollout right now with

the engineering community but that would be something that we would publish from just a high level perspective to

say you know you could come into the organization from an eit and then you know potentially go to two

different tracks and you’ve got those options available to you from a career planning

you know in a development planning perspective yeah so broad-based from from that group yes but

individually yes i totally agree with you yeah i i hear you now um

a big part of that is making sure you have a system to capture it because it takes resources to keep that updated

and then skills and qualifications that you constantly know um yours even is updated when there’s a

consideration or an agreement that you are progressing in your career so that’s the other part of the puzzle

perspective is designing the system appropriately for for it to be shown to the individual

organization would you like to add anything nope okay

okay so um there is a shift in the way succession planning is perceived and

maybe this is also a good question to ask our audience and they can comment in the chat box

um from your respective examples as organizations are our organizations shifting any aspects

of their current succession planning practices and if so why and that’s given that the audience may be at different stages

of maturity within their own organizations so perhaps tisha you can take this one

yes um you know we talked a little bit about this but i

think that what what i’m definitely seeing is is definitely the critical roles

identification for sure and really understanding that um but i also think that there is a

shift towards having more of the talent-based conversations through succession

planning really understanding um development opportunities or development needs of individuals when

we’re we’re talking about them from a talent perspective and we’re talking about them for you

know next level roles and what does that look like um and you know seeing that emergence of

of of these talent reviews coming up and and being integrated into the succession

conversation so you know yes you’re talking about um future leaders for for some of those

leadership roles but then now you’re also talking about these critical rules and who are in those roles and where are they

um and and how do we see them and and then also just you know

integrating that this conversation into the next follow-up conversation as now how does

that feed into workforce planning and then how does that feel fit into your talent strategy so

so having the you know your your your plan on what

you do about that individual is not just from a one conversation it’s it’s so many other conversations

that link into what you what are the organization efforts that are put into development career planning recruiting

um maybe even in how the organization looks from an org design perspective as well too

so that’s what i would offer to that

nicole would you like to comment um no i think tisha did a great job

capturing all of it yeah okay sheila no i’m good

as well i thought she did a really good job okay sounds good so um what are some of the challenges

you have seen emerge as a result of bad succession planning so the barriers is there barriers to

success uh what was the lessons learned so i open it up to to the panelists

i can i can chime in um first and foremost um they you know it’s

a plan it’s treated as an independent exercise so you spend all the time coming up with

this plan and you do absolutely nothing with it and as we all know

then it starts losing its value and credibility and people will not have to climb into it um that

is not something that i have seen um some of the challenges with it and it’s not tied to the rest of the

system as i mentioned um where you know you start to see some great

conversations and this is what was called out as well in the in the guidebook is you know

what would it look like to have a committee taking a look at you know all your succession planning candidates

and really having a focus on how do we develop them for the next role

and it might not be upwards it might be hey sally is going to be role ready in two years

but why don’t we put her under this stretch assignment and being able to have that oversight and taking a look at how

do we first i’ll activate against it um but as well make sure that we’re feeding

it and making sure we’re helping people get ready uh sheila touched upon this a little bit as well

and the other thing that one just has to be careful of is you know our bias you know some

people have been in the organization for a while and we might have some perceptions

and you know how how do we make sure that we’re entering those conversations what are those checks and balances

that we’re not bringing up what happened five years ago that we have a growth mindset a learning mindset around these people

um because we see that happen from time to time and that we’re um making sure that we’re entering those

kind of conversations with an open mind and an open perspective

i’ll just add on to that because when we do planning sometimes we forget

take on the lens around are they willing and capable of moving forward with the plan too so

motivation wise we do make those biased almost decisions and and that

could set up the person not necessarily for success on where they want to go um

we’ll make assumptions or not listen appropriately so there’s all these other little pieces that cause

problems within it that aren’t necessarily captured so those nuances are important to keep in mind

and and talk through with the individual yeah you know you raised an interesting

point um you know i there was a conversation that i was part of

um in a previous um previous organization and there was a perception that okay the

role’s ready it comes to me and what if i’m just not ready now like my my stage in life it’s not where i want

to be and how how do you make people feel like how can people still feel safe and feel that

they have um you know some upward mobility and organization if it might not be the right time

and the other thing that i’m seeing as well as the shift between okay the role comes up do we

make people compete on it um or do we just take those people because we’ve been developing them and

putting them into place and what are the pros and cons around that and is that a mechanism for

people to be able to say okay it’s just not the right time for me and that’s okay um

you know having the perception that someone’s competing for a role does that set them up well for

that um next assignment but these are some of the things that i’m observing it in real time and in an

organization 100 and then i’m adding on again to that is that um we have a

bunch of um employees that are going to retire over the next five years and then the gen x

category i’d say or age range are there’s not as many people as then

millennials so that’s part of why people are saying well maybe i’m just not in the life stage where i am ready to take

on that senior senior role and then i have seen as well

the competition of millennial that wants to have the role

and how to how do we keep that moving for the individual without causing a conflict that’s not healthy

so that’s as very interesting or demotivate the individual

yeah and i would say i agree i agree um with with both of your insights and a

non-biased piece too with respect to uh you know the millennials i think that

there’s also i i’ve seen this where there there has been this bias around you know

in order to move into that next role and succeed it’s it’s your time in the chair uh

right versus these these capabilities and potential that you bring to the table

and and recognizing like who’s actually ever fully ready for that leadership role

like no one right but you know it’s it’s the feeling is right for you the

timing is right um the body of work that you’ve done um has has prepared you enabled you to be

able to be like i i can step into that and and and do it and of course i’m gonna learn and i’m gonna

grow along the way so um from the bias piece i think that bias is is huge thanks for bringing that up

nicole because and and sheila because it’s really a thing that i think

many i know we are really trying to integrate that and trying to really think about you know busting some of

these biases in these conversations and um i know our organization has been

really promoting over the over the past few years and even more so in the past few years

to really look at you know how long have have somebody been in a role and if

this person’s indicated that their they’ve got this interest in leadership then

let’s see is as nicole said is there a stretch assignment we could get them on to where they’re now getting exposed to

other things other bodies of work other people um move them around is that the right

move for them sort of thing right and just try to just build this diversity

of even just their own business knowledge in the organization and go have a different perspective

coming into a whole other team in different work and see how that goes for you and then come back because now when you

you know when that opportunity comes up you’ll just now have this broader this broader experience and and just

more under your tool that tool belt that’s why i didn’t widened you out but i think that one of if i were to flip

off of the bias one of the things i think sheila you touched on that is is a fill that i’ve seen

is is when a person who is a successor has been identified successor has had no

conversation with their leader about it and it just doesn’t even come up as a conversation at any point in time

yet you know they’re talked about a lot there you know other people see them as as successors and and moving

into the organization but they themselves have just not had that conversation and and so they just leave the organization

if they don’t see indicators that you know um somebody has interest in me

or the organization is going to put some energies and and interest in me to do something

further here then i’ll just i’ll just look elsewhere and so that’s that’s something that you

know is uh a challenge you know i would say organizationally for just the whole process of it all but

then from from a talent perspective is is when you when you lose the the people that you consider to be top talent

and you know for us we’re smaller organizations so we just have that challenge all together on not having that

opportunity for everybody to be able to move up upwards so we’ve been really

trying to bake into and with leaders really like hey let’s let’s really just unpack this message

around career development and development opportunities that it does not have to be all all vertical and and there’s there’s

there’s value and richness in the horizontal as well and that goes into the development

of if you’re in this function how do we get them experience and exposure to all the

different other functions in order to be successful instead of them oh yes now for them to take a larger scope of

responsibility without setting them up for because that’s also a challenge i

see now is is that it’s like here you go and unfortunately things changed

and life is changing drastically as we know um are we equipping them to our points

around cultural differences are we equipping them with the fact that the world is changing and it’s more

purpose-driven and so how to talk to our employees around their well-being in different ways

and so is that what we consider a high potential so all these things are getting to come

out right versus are you a hard performer right which is how you usually would

have come up through succession planning or replacement planning

extremely interesting i’m just harvested yeah yeah it seems so logical yet it’s so

difficult to implement yes right like as i’m hearing these conversations

um i’m just cognizant of time i think it would be a great opportunity now for to uh for the

audience to ask some questions so i open up the floor uh the chat box is open so let’s just

give a few seconds um i mean i’m always interested in hearing from from the subject matter experts

themselves like yourselves is there anything that you can suggest based on your experience

um to new like hr leaders and business professionals that you can you know say or comment on in this

regard i’ll give my one advice on mistakes i’ve made

and that is if you keep planning without checking in with your units and this you’re just

going to keep chasing and writing but nothing’s progressing so my advice

is always make sure you reach out to your business units and have more of the conversation versus filling out the checklists all

the time yes i i 100 agree on that sheila and i would also add to

in that reach out your your business leaders as well so you know have the conversations with

the senior leaders of that line organization getting ready to go into this process

understand with them what’s going to be helpful for their team i you know i i would say that you know

in our experience we’ve got different teams engaged and think in very different ways so we have some

teams that we have to really set up a whole bunch of thinking for them first and free thinking and

hear some questions and and get them in the zone so that they can really when we come to

the conversation they’ve kind of thought through all of that already and are not necessarily on the spot when um

we’re in discussion so those are some that’s probably the best advice that we

get and just like and always be listening like listening with what you’re hearing in the conversation because

i can’t tell you how many times you go through success i’ve gone through succession and it’s like hey you know you’re prepared you’ve

got all this stuff and you go through a conversation like wow okay meant to load that one for next year or

next conversation or yeah i think we want to think about this and i think as a practitioner you’re all

sometimes you’re always in program mode too so you know you do also need to let

yourself be present in the moment but also be thinking about what are you hearing from the business

what are some questions that are coming up is there things that they’re not understanding around the process that

you can help enable is there something around internal programs that maybe will be more helpful

or beneficial from a development perspective there’s so much things you get from that conversation and being

part of the conversation i think is is is such a a blessing to be able to be

at that you know at the table with them as they’re talking to their business and they’re talking through the talent

so it’s just an opportunity to always be thinking around how do we help enable this process to be

more fluid more dynamic or more meaningful or where do we need to shift i loved what

sheila said on how echo’s really thinking around what is that um you know that top talent

and the potential because they’re thinking about the well-being and so

you know you know running to the ground and maybe even running yourself to the ground is that something that

we value like is that really what what we’re valuing and maybe we need to

really think about that because that’s not really the case right and so you know the pandemic

definitely has raised that to the forefront where you know employees like across the world i’m sure

we all were there where those moments were like wow like having flexibility

was is everything and then you know having to really just prioritize and say there’s so much that

can just get done here and moving forward how does the shape shape and shift you and many people

from a value proposition you know they’re choosing employers whether their current employer are they going to stay

or or new employers where they’re going to go based on on a well-being and how

that organization positions well-being and that mindset around well-being and um and you know it

because that’s a form of taking care of your people and also you know encouraging them to take care of themselves

um one of the lessons that i would offer is perfection is not the goal yeah um

you know and it’s not about having the perfect plan it’s about having continuous perfect conversations and no

you know just that’s the goal is keep it have the conversations continue to have them don’t make it a

plan don’t put it on the table come back revisit it and figure out how to

integrate it um i think too often as hr practitioners we tend to make this process and it’s an

hr process and how can it be integrated um back to sheila’s point if you’re

talking about find the financial outcomes each month how do you bring in

the conversation in there hey johnny is on this path we’ve put him into these development assignments how do we have

the conversation about how he’s doing and just integrate it and once we can start integrating our hr

processes then it will start to be seen as business processes and it will just become part of the

culture so find small ways of being able to link it in

and perfection is not the goal okay so i actually have a great question

that ties in with the conversations and it’s um have there been unexpected benefits as a result of your succession

planning i’ll open up to the four i know for example like we’re

currently relaunching we relaunched our leadership accord on diversity equity and inclusion so there’s a big push

um with focus on hiring and promoting a more diverse workforce for example

would you see that in your workplaces for example i i truly believe if if we have a bit

more transparency on how we do succession planning within an organization

including you know all of yours you will see engagement go up you see

your net promoter score of your company i truly truly believe that

yeah i have a specific right to endorse it 100 but i do see it

benefit absolutely sheila and what we know is when your employees are engaged you

have better business outcomes so there’s all it’s part of the value

chain i think the other thing is well is um and i touched upon this when we opened

up our conversation is it’s also a value prop it’s something that can be an attraction piece for um

you know people coming in and joining your organization if they know that this is something that

you put stock and value into i kind of laugh a little bit you know our security team can’t be like oh come

work at max because we have great security systems but we can become work at nmax because

you know we care about developing our people so you know there’s there’s a lot of opportunity there

exactly yeah agreed that’s quite interesting because um

we do need to have it in the employee value proposition more i i feel that at least so it’s equally as

important to know we’re developing our people are people obsessed and as much as we do

our clients tisha anything to you would like to add

i honestly i i think that nicole and sheila really

highlighted the key points there like i i i wouldn’t have anything to add

further but just really just adding some adding supports to the employer value proposition and you

know you’re as an organization trying to position yourself as an employer of choice

it’s it’s not so much about you know what you say about yourself it’s it’s

about the experiences that employees are having and employee experiences

is uh is is a whole thing in itself it’s a you know within hr it

definitely is a in an emerging well i won’t say it’s emerging it’s been there but it’s

it’s definitely been propelled to a lot of conversations around you know how how we look at those

similar to how companies who have customers look at their customer it’s taking that customer

experience lend and i’ll shift lens and shifting it to the employee and

and uh we we know without needing to have any data you

know that when you are transparent about things that are happening in the organization um you do have mobile as sheila said and

so you know when it with a process like this and i think nicole had said it earlier

um or sheila forgive me i can’t remember who said it but um it’s just like raffling between the

being extremely transparent and and allowing this process where you you are you’re putting energies into

certain decisions around certain people and sometimes you know these positions just don’t get posted because you’re inactivating

your succession plan but i think you know to the point on transparency as as long as that’s really well crafted

in your organization and people really understand that and even just on the concepts of session planning just understand that

yes you know there’s there’s thoughts and there’s decisions that are are being made it’s just a plan

like it’s nicole said this is this is this year you know next year things could change in pivot

and that’s okay and it’s not as fixed it’s it’s something that we are thinking

of at this point in time and providing that the employee has interest in this

space as well too then we want to try to see what we can do from a development perspective

but yeah i i think that it ultimately it really does drive up your

your um your net promoter score internally in your own organization and also what people externally um

see you as and and hear from others as to whether or not other people will will promote your

organization as a as a place of work

okay i’m just looking at the time and i’m afraid i have to stop it here so um so uh just to sum up so what i’m

hearing uh for various reasons and most recently because of the pandemic

as organizations are starting to plan for the return to the office and um to the office setting that is and

what that looks like for the future of work uh organizations should have a dedicated focus around succession planning

and one that is simply not a replacement planning process anymore um it’s just not the leadership

roles that are critical organizations need to determine what those mission critical positions

are we should be approaching our people and talented capital needs as

wisely as our financial capital needs a one-size-fits-all approach to succession planning does not work

a succession planning strategy in the absence of a development strategy will result in little traction

and that succession planning needs to be fully entrenched enough on a workplace culture

i also heard the key to adding value and creating forward action is the development of talent and

regardless of how mature your succession planning process may be the succession planning guidebook is a

very helpful tool particularly when it comes to mitigating risk uh if there aren’t any further comments

uh i would like to thank our panelists for taking the time to talk all things succession planning with us here today

and sharing your insights um i found the conversations to be not only very timely but fascinating i would like to thank

our audience for joining us i would also like to thank the government of alberta in partnership

with the government of canada for supporting this project again you can find the succession

planning guidebook on our website at electricityhr.ca and again if you have any questions or comments

please do not hesitate to reach out to us directly we are here to support you and we are supported by a great team of

individuals across across the sector across the country that can help us

help you so i sincerely thank you for your time and i hope you enjoyed this session

thank you so much thank you thank you